Why is the BlackBerry better than Windows Mobile?

This is a serious question, not a product war. I am not a Blackberry (BB) user so I really don't know. For enterprise customers with Exchange, why would you pick a BB as your corporate standard over Exchange? In addition for enterprise customers, why do consumers seem to flock to the BB as well? I am really interested in your thoughts as to why the BB is better than Windows Mobile.

I’m a fan of Windows Mobile for the versatility. I don’t use a blackberry by choice but when trying one it was clearly better for business needs, even though it was technically simpler. I’m not an enterprise user, but I would think the following reasons would apply:

– Boot time. WM = 2 mins and regularly, I don’t even remember having to wait for the blackberry.

– Time to ‘on’. WM = 6 seconds or more. Blackberry = less than a second.

– Usability, the blackberry is usable without a touchscreen.

– The blackberry was quicker even with a slower CPU.

– Lower memory needs, the blackberry didn’t seem to run out of memory whereas every WM phone I’ve used seems to be consistently out of memory (for applications AND storage).

– The screen was more readable even though it was an old tech screen, maybe because it just had what was needed on it.

– Less hassles. My windows mobile 5 device used to crash on recieving phonecalls occasionally. My mobile 6 device reboots randomly when on the internet. Both devices don’t answer phone calls as soon as you press the button.

– Push e-mail that is open. Frankly not everyone runs exchange, support for push e-mail from your enterprise deployment of ANY mail server is more versatile than being limited to just exchange.

– Better physical casing (at least with the one I saw versus several new WM devices). The blackberry was simple black plastic, no glossy silver that scratches are visible on.

BB are designed for the work environment and the reliability expected there. Windows devices try to operate in both home and work environments, and they just can’t do that so well. It would make a huge difference if WM devices came with desktops that made business sense. For instance, business users don’t give a hoot about Windows Media Player on a day to day basis. Who cares if it can play MP3s or not.

A good start would be something like if the WM device is syncing over the air to an Exchange server, then the default desktop should be showing email. I should not have to push a button to read email when a new email comes in.

The BB that I carried for a while was reliable, it showed email all of the time, and all I had to do was start dialing, and it would call.

Compared to BlackBerry or even Nokia IntelliSync I see the following disadvantages:

Management:

In BB / IntelliSync you can configure if a user should be able to surf in the internet or to install software, disable camera, …. With WM mobile you would need additional to do manage these settings.

HTML E-Mail:

WM5 does not display HTML mail correctly. This is fixed with WM6 but today there are only a few devices – at least in germany – with WM6. And for most devices there would not be an update from WM5 to WM6.

I can only compare my own experiences (w/ a Vodaphone v1240 (WM5)) with those of close friends who have Blackberries (which I’ve messed about with).

I certainly noticed the Blackberry had limitations, and often found myself thinking "Oh, it can’t do X…" but it was never for something fundamental.

Blackberry seems to have got the reliability vs functionality set correct.

I do find I’m becoming less and less keen on my WM5 phone as it’s got some difficult to understand bugs. My own expectations are probably shifting a little but it’s still bad news for the platform.

There’s clearly something that goes on with Silent/normal profiles, meaning the alarm often goes off silently when I’ve set it to a loud or vibrate profile (which is a nightmare when it happens!) What makes this so annoying is the lack of consistency in going wrong. I also get things like switching BT/Wifi/Phone network connection on/off causing odd behaviour. This sort of thing is so fundamental that it drives me away from the platform despite it’s obvious benefits.

The problem is how to get the genie back in the bottle – now you have all the flexibility and features, you can’t take them away (to make focussing on reliability easier) as someone will always get their nose out of joint…

I consider myself a heavy mobile phone user (not a power user but a heavy one). I carry a standard off the shelf Motorola Q with the factory installed stuff. I have since added the mobile slingplayer from slingmedia, and Office Mobile Communicator to my phone. No additional storage cards or anything. I do a LOT of e-mail, and I don’t have a touch screen. I also do a lot of voice calls, calendaring, web surfing mobile enabled sites, and I just don’t have problems with running out of memory. My point here is that if you are doing the same thing on your BB that you did with your Windows Mobile device you are saying you were running out of memory? I understand if you were running your music player, some game, e-mail and four other apps. However if you are telling me you checking your schedule working thru e-mail, viewing docs, surfing the web and taking calls you are running into memory issues, I am really taken by that because that is what I spend a large portion of my day doing, over my phone.

I am stilling looking for more objective statements/evidence on why BB is more popular than Windows Mobile devices.

Having spent a great deal of time researching both Windows Mobile and Blackberry for our mobile solution, I see the differences as.

Security – The security of Blackberry handsets and the encryption methods, the delivery of email and internet connection is vastly superior to Windows mobile. The way that you can lock down the handset by itpolicy is simply fantastic.

Running costs – I dont know what its like in the US, but mobile data in Europe is still very expensive especially when roaming to foreign networks. Blackberry consumes far less bandwidth than Windows Mobile. We did tests to two users in Germany and the Blackberry cost 6 times less to do the same amount of work. As we have lots of sales people constantly n the road this was a major consideration.

Lastly, as mentioed previously, we have a lot of people who are out and about all the time, which makes battery life a major consideration. Blackberry in this regard are vastly superior.

Im my opinion Windows Mobile has its place in the market for small companies, but for Enterprises, blackberry wins hands down right now.